CLARKSVILLE, Tenn. – Clarksville residents on Labor Day took part in a nationwide rally, demanding “evidence-based healthcare and humanity to child birth.”

Women at the rally said they have to fight to birth their babies while under pressure from doctors to have Cesarean sections performed.

Kendra Paulson, who helped spearhead Monday’s rally and baby fair, said that after careful research, she decided to have her baby at Vanderbilt Hospital in order to get “evidence-based healthcare.”

“Vanderbilt wasn’t doing anything out of liability or profit concerns,” Paulson said. “Their methods were up-to-date. So I delivered there, had a wonderful experience, and I’m pregnant again and will be doing the same thing. Driving past a hospital to go 50 minutes down to another one is not the most convenient option, but it’s what a lot of women in the community do.”

‘It’s like you’re a prisoner’

Christy Hunter, a photographer, was not only at the baby fair to display her baby photography, but also to advocate as part of the rally. She had four vaginal births (VBACs) after her first birth was done by a C-section.

“Every time I was pregnant, I was fought by the hospitals,” Hunter said. “They could change their policy anytime they wanted to. Midway through each pregnancy they’d tell me, ‘Oh, our policy has changed, so we’re not going to allow you to have a VBAC. Or if we do, it’s very supervised. You’ll have to be hooked up to all these machines and you’ll have to have an epidural and we’ll have to break your water.’

Hunter said she didn’t want to do all that and wrote letters to all the hospital administrators.

“Each time they said, ‘OK. Give this lady what she wants. She’s fought so hard each time,’” said Hunter.

On her last baby, Hunter said, midway through labor they told her that she had to have an epidural and they had to break her water. In the middle of labor, she said, they offered her a C-section, which she didn’t want.

“It’s like you’re a prisoner or something,” Hunter said. “They can just change their policy and it’s as if they own you.”

Hunter said she was given an epidural, which she said was completely unnecessary.

“It turns out that they had not changed the policy,” said Hunter. “The doctors talked amongst the doctors. It was really scarring to me. I couldn’t have a delivery that I wanted to have.”

After making a complaint to the administration, Hunter said, the hospital paid for the delivery.

“They are now totally friendly to midwives and natural birth,” said Hunter. “So I’m glad to have had that kind of influence. I do know for a fact that the hospital did change some of their policy.”

About the organization

The rally is part of the organization ImprovingBirth.org, founded in 2012 by San Diego resident Dawn Thompson, a doula and a patient of three C-sections. IB is partnered with BirthNetwork International, International Cesarean Awareness Network and Human Rights in Childbirth.

In 2013, IB claimed to have representatives in more than 160 cities across the country.

According to studies from IB and other researchers, there is a rise of C-section births in recent years that complicates births in what would otherwise be uncomplicated. That number, according to the World Health Organization, is 1 in 3 out of 4.1 million births per year.